


An Amazing Lie

by kynikos



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Crazy Azula (Avatar), Fire Nation (Avatar), Fire Nation Royal Family, Gen, Honor, War
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-17
Updated: 2020-09-21
Packaged: 2021-03-07 23:00:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,851
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26505550
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kynikos/pseuds/kynikos
Summary: What matters, and what is dead? Honor is a hard thing to find, and even harder to hold onto. And the Fire Nation makes it hard even to know what honor truly is.Ramblings of the Fire Nation. Philosophy of war, and honor, and fire, and family, and death.
Comments: 6
Kudos: 7





	1. Beginnings

I was very young when I first saw war. It was not death, destruction, plague, famine; none of these things. I was in a palace, a golden shining palace on a hill, miles and miles and half a world away from any of that. What I saw of war was beautiful. I saw the soldiers in their armor, gleaming beneath the sun, marching down to the ships; I saw the swords, sharp and clean and brilliant, in my eyes tools rather than weapons. I saw the Fire Nation, preparing to lead the world to a bright future, a future of peace and equality.

War was a sound that promised peace. I saw the soldiers going to bring truth to the world, marching down the hill to the ocean, rows and rows, rank upon rank, in neat lines like the soldiers I had in my toy chest that I could set up and knock down.

The real soldiers never got knocked down. Not where I could see. The ones that did get knocked down did not come back up the hill in their shiny rows; they were taken to the military hospitals on the other side of the nation, or else they were buried beneath six feet of earth in Tazei’s Field.

When I was very, very young, my father placed me atop the railing of his balcony, overlooking the city, and we watched Commander Dazho’s regiment march to the bay. I saw the sunlight on their helms, and heard the pounding of their boots on the stone, and smelled the bitter smoke floating to the palace from the warships in the harbor, and I clapped and shouted in pleasure. I could not have been more than two years old.

When I was a few years older, I was given a knife, the hilt carved by an earth kingdom prisoner, the blade forged from the throatsteel of a dragon my grandfather had killed. An inscription along the blade read ‘From honor, life’. Immortality is something granted by those who come after, my father told me. To live forever is to be remembered forever; if your name does not die from the hearts of your nation, then neither will you. And honor is what secures you a place in the hearts of a people. A people will remember a man who held his honor.

As I grew, war was the cornerstone of my faith in my nation. The war offered a place to prove one’s honor; the war offered a place to prove one’s worth. I gradually learned more about the war, and saw it less and less through the eyes of my childhood, but always the first thing that came to mind when thinking of ‘The War’ was the sunlight flashing off the soldiers’ armor, and the joy of the black smoke from the ships.

When I was eleven, I saw a man die.

He was a soldier. His name was Dan Sho. He had been part of the campaign against the southernmost earth provinces, and he had been struck by an earthbent stone, just beneath the ribcage. He had not died – not right away – but had been brought back to the Fire Nation. He had been put in the hospital, but had left, hoping to see his mother. He knew he was going to die.

I was in the market, my attendants buying fruit for me to sample. I saw him collapse into an alleyway, and demanded to see what was wrong with him. I spoke to him as he died – he had not found his mother, and begged me to find her and give her his love – and watched his body be taken away. I had never seen death. I had never so much as thought of death.

I had not known our soldiers could die, you see. I thought when they were knocked down, they could be stood back up again. But Dan Sho never stood up again, and my understanding of the war changed.

It was a living thing, now. It was like fire itself, something to be controlled and directed and aimed at the enemy – but it could turn against you, and it could leave wounds. It could burn.

I did not cry. My father would never have allowed it, and I would not have considered it. It would have been dishonorable. And I lit no candles for Dan Sho, and I forgot the message he had begged me to give his mother, and after a month I could no longer remember his face.

He died twice.

The day before I turned twelve I watched an Agni Kai. Two generals had challenged each other, for honor. They fought for what seemed like hours, though later I realized it could not have been more than a few minutes. Finally one of them slipped, and the other one killed him, and that was that. It was the second time I had seen death. It did not surprise me so much as the first one; this time, Agni had decreed that there should be a death, and honor should be bestowed upon one and not the other. It was all very proper and orderly.

This is how death should be, I decided. There should be honor at stake. Death before hundreds of eyes, in a battle, against a worthy opponent. Not a miserable _ending_ in a dirty alley, gasping out secrets to a boy as you bleed out on the inside. There was no honor in _that_ kind of death. That was hardly death at all. It was a dying, rather than a death; a slow, worthless, vanishing, destined to be forgotten and un-mourned.

If I wished to have honor, there should be a worth to my life, and a worth to my death. Something should be done, something accomplished, before I ended.

On my twelfth birthday my father sent a warship to the north that bore my name. It was his gift to me, and I treasured it more than all the rest of the celebrations. I swore to myself that someday I would see that ship.

I never did. It was destroyed before it ever returned.

I saw much of the war from then on. It was constant in all of our minds, in all of our doings; everything and everyone in the palace, it seemed, had to do with the war. Ba Sing Se, in particular. I wanted to be the one sent against it. I wanted to conquer the city, something no one else had ever done.

But I did not see Ba Sing Se for a long time.

When I was thirteen I killed a man in Agni Kai, and my father told me I had earned my title of prince; when I was sixteen I went to war, armed and armored as was befitting of a fire nation warrior.

And there I saw much of the war that had not been clear in the safety of the palace walls. The child had seen the armor, and thought how pretty the sun looked dancing upon it; but now the man saw the armor and thought only of whether it could stop one more arrow. The child had heard the boots of many men, marching, and clapped along to the rhythm of it; but now the man heard the marching soldiers and wondered where to send them that as few as possible would be killed.

But the smoke had not changed. The smoke still smelled of victory. The smoke still brought joy, and when the sky turned dark with it, or the snow turned black with it, I still smiled.

When I was a man I returned to my home and married, and had a child. I named him Zuko, in the hope that he would bring me honor; I named him Zuko in the hope that he would keep me alive.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so very tired, without really having a right to be. But hey, writing this is a productive use of the limited time I have to spare. Much better than doing my actual work, or sticking to a schedule. Or drinking water. 
> 
> (Completely unimportant: I said something about the throatsteel of a dragon because I have a... headcanon? does that word apply here?... that dragons produce flammable oil that they then spit past a flint-and-steel in their throats, which they can use to ignite the oil. Obviously ATLA dragons firebend and do not actually have or need a throatsteel. But I put it in there anyway because I want to.)
> 
> I hate Ozai. Writing this has not changed my opinion in the slightest.
> 
> Survive!


	2. Ceremonial

_When the Fire Lords of old won great victories, they wore white, to symbolize the white heat of their inner fire. Their blood runs in your veins._

* * *

You will be two years old. You will walk down the halls of your palace – your father’s palace – and you will see the tapestries of your ancestors. They will look down upon you and you will feel their eyes on you like burning brands. You will sit down in the center of that hall and you will cry.

Your father will find you there, sobbing. He will be very displeased.

You will

* * *

Your hair will be put up for the first time in the traditional style, worn by the children of the Fire Lord during public appearances. Your mother will be watching, and there will be an attendant on either side of you, carefully forming your hair into its perfect shape. One of them will place the last pin into its place and then they will stand back, hands clasped in front of them and heads bowed, waiting for your mother’s approval.

She will look, critically and carefully. Then she will give a nod, and the two servants will leave.

She will bend down in front of you and tip your head so that you will look into her eyes. ‘Azula,’ she will say. ‘You know that today is a special day. And that you must be on your best behavior, as befits a princess of the Fire Nation.’ You will nod, eyes wide at the seriousness of her tone.

She will turn your head to face the mirror, and you will both look, staring into each other’s eyes. ‘My little girl,’ she will say. ‘Growing up so quickly. Look how our hair is the same—'

And she will smile and kiss you – carefully, so as not to mar either of your makeup – in the center of your forehead.

And then you will both

* * *

You will spar with Zuko often, especially when you are just learning bending. You will both eventually discover that you far outmatch him, but for a short time, when he has been training for two years and you have been training for half of one, you will train with and against him in the great round room, tiled and glazed in the pattern of the ancient Saito era.

‘You’re getting better,’ he will say, encouragingly, and you will smile and press the attack.

He will slip.

Your father will be there, in the shadows, watching. Neither of you will have noticed him until he steps into the center of the room.

‘Your kicks are weak,’ he will say. ‘Your shield form is sloppy.’ He will turn to go. ‘Pathetic.’ And he will be gone.

Zuko will hold back tears – you will be able to tell even in the darkness of the round room – and he will leave as soon as your father’s footsteps die away.

He will

* * *

You will try doubly hard to live up to your father’s standards. He _will_ be the Fire Lord, after all, and will of course expect nothing less than your best.

You will learn what will please him and what will not. Obedience will please him (unless he calls it weakness); initiative will please him (unless he calls it disloyalty); strength will please him (unless he calls it disrespect). It will be hard, but that will of course be at the center of being the daughter of the Fire Lord.

You will learn that Zuko will rarely find favor with your father. And that you will be expected to compete with your brother; compete for your father’s approval.

That will

* * *

Your mother will call you a monster.

Your brother will call you a liar.

You will never learn exactly what your uncle thinks of you until much later, but from the letters he will send while he is away you will be able to make a fairly accurate guess.

Your father will present you to Fire Lord Azulon with pride, as you spin and kick and bend in the center of the throne room, and will smile at your accomplishments. And you will be young, very young, but you will make a decision about whose approval will matter and whose will not.

And you will

* * *

It will be hard to know when to do what things. Like with the turtleducks in the pond; you will never be quite sure how to treat them, and your mother will never approve.

Your mother and father will be so different yet so similar. They will seem to expect completely opposite things from you, yet respond in the same way whenever you fail to meet their expectations.

You will disappoint both, often. You will struggle, tugged and pulled at the center of their opposing moralities.

But as you grow older you will begin to realize that you will not be able to make both of them happy; that you will have to choose.

And it will be

* * *

It will be very warm, on the day of the Agni Kai, and you will watch from the sidelines as your father will burn Zuko’s face, before hundreds of eyes, in the center of the arena. Zuko will beg, plead, scream for mercy, for forgiveness. And your father will ignore him.

You will not expect any different from the Fire Lord.

You will not be quite sure what it will be that Zuko did; but you will be certain that, whatever it will be, it will not be the only reason for the banishment that will follow. It will simply be the straw that broke the camel-cat’s back; the last of a long line of failures and disappointments that Zuko will have built up over the years, finally surpassing your father’s patience with his least-favorite child and instigating the banishment.

After Zuko leaves, you will be even more cautious around your father. You will not be sure how long you will last.

And he will

* * *

You will find purpose, eventually. You will find purpose in the tasks your father will set for you. And you will be very good at it, as you will be very good at everything you do.

Your brother will fail in his mission, but you will throw yourself into it with the reckless abandon which will gain approval with your father. You will take the approval and use it, as you will every other emotion, to stoke the inner raging fire that will be at the center of your being. You will think you have discovered the secret. And you will be happy.

You will think you will be happy.

And that will have to

* * *

There will be long days and nights, fierce battles and bitter losses, along the long and winding path of your journey. You will fear failure, some nights. You will fear the pain of losing face in front of the only two people you will ever truly care for. And you will push even them away, or they will push you away, or both at the same time, and you will lose them. And the center will not hold. You will feel that you are falling apart.

Your mother will call you a monster, when you will be very young. And she will vanish.

Your brother will call you a liar. And he will go away.

Your uncle will call you crazy. And he will go against you and everything you will stand for.

Your friends will betray you. Your guards will betray you. Your servants will betray you.

Everyone will

* * *

There will be one day, one day only, when you are happy.

You will almost be a woman, that day. It will be the day of the comet. You will be crowned, soon. You will be wearing your mother’s robes – the ceremonial robes of a female Fire Lord.

You will walk along the halls of the palace, and you will stare back at the faces of the Fire Lords of old, and you will spit at them, and you will burn them down with a sweep of your hand. And they will crumble to ash at your feet, and you will laugh in the triumph of your coming crown.

Your servants will form your hair into that careful style befitting of a Fire Lord being presented publicly, and you will shout them away, and you will tear out the pin, and you will cut your hair, and you will throw the table into one corner and the chair into the other.

(And your mother will be there. But you will break the mirror. You will _not_ be her ‘little girl’ – you will be the Fire Lord.)

And you will be ecstatically happy, and you will sob into the sleeves of her robe, collapsed in a heap in the center of your room, the ghosts of your ancestors looking down on you.

And it will

* * *

_When the Fire Lords of old won great victories, they wore white, to symbolize the white heat of their inner fire. Their blood runs in your veins._

_On that glorious day, when the comet blazed in the skies, your father named you Fire Lord._

_And you were clothed in white._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No one ever taught me how to write in second-person future tense. Just another failing of the education system, I guess. 
> 
> (That was a joke. Haha.)
> 
> The _bit_ at the end may make less sense if you don't know anything about what happened to Azula after the show? I'm not sure. Anyway, have a nice day. Survive!


End file.
